Negative Gamer

I Bought Your Game, Let me Play it

Halfleft — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 11:29:41 +0000

I play Halo 3 quite a lot. Granted my amount of play has been steadily decreasing over time but it’s still statistically my most played game. I’m quite good. Not crazy good but I can hold my own pretty consistently. When I’m with a team of friends list people it’s great fun and we rock teh halols, so-to-speak. However, Microsoft’s money-grabbing antics are starting to irk me and have prompted this rant. It’s gotten to the point where I’m expected to pay through the teeth just to be able to play the game to its fullest extent.

I’m all for downloadable content. I think it’s a great idea and clearly an important stage in the development of our favourite hobby. It enables developers to continue to support their product beyond its release. I’m even a fan of DLC map packs. It’s a great way for developers to make money and it provides some optional content for the player. What I am not a fan of is being punished by having game features taken away from me just because I unfortunately don’t excrete cash or just because I spend what little I have on unimportant things like food.

Before I go on here’s a list of the playlist DLC requirements (not including double exp weekend playlists);

Ranked:

Lone Wolves (No DLC Required)
Team Slayer (Heroic, Legendary, and Mythic Map Packs Required)
Team Doubles (All DLC Required)
Squad Battle (Heroic Map Pack Required)
MLG (Heroic Map Pack Required)
Team SWAT (All DLC Required)
Team Snipers (Heroic and Legendary Map Packs Required)

Unranked:

Basic Training (No DLC Required)
Action Sack (All DLC Required)
Rumble Pit (All DLC Required)
Social Slayer (No DLC Required)
Social Team DLC (Heroic, Legendary, and Mythic Map Packs Required)
Social Skirmish (No DLC Required)
Multi Team (Heroic, Legendary, and Mythic Map Packs Required)
Social Big Team (Heroic, Legendary, and Mythic Map Packs Required.)

Let’s have a look then. Four Playlists can be played with no DLC whatsoever including the beginner training playlist. Luckily enough for us cheap skates map packs tend to get made free after a while. Currently there’s one free map pack for Halo and one stand alone map (Cold Storage). The free DLC is the Heroic map pack.

Say a player has been wise enough to nab all of the free packs. What does this enable him/her to play? Six playlists. And that’s including the ‘no DLC required’ playlists. That’s Six out of fifteen playlists (the bold ones in those lists). Does that not strike you as unbelievably annoying.

Call of Duty: WaW does something that makes my blood boil. It allows players into any playlist, which is clearly a good thing. But it thinks nothing of starting a countdown into a game which requires a map that a player doesn’t have. Then, in a move that makes me want to dash the walls with my own brain matter, the game starts without you. It boots you from the lobby THEN OPENS THE GUIDE MARKETPLACE PAGE SO YOU CAN BUY THE MAP. That infuriates me. Did you see all of those upper-case letters just then? It takes a lot for me to use those.

One might argue that Halo 3 does something similar with its reminders upon starting the game. But even those have an air of tongue-in-cheek about them. I’ve always liked Bungie’s sense of humour. It’s difficult to take a studio too seriously when they keep a pickled dog’s head in their building AND include it in their seven step plan for world domination.

Would it be impossible to just mirror all the playlists and make one set DLC-enabled? Or perhaps just use a flag system which enables the matchmaking system to check which maps players in a lobby do or do not have and start games accordingly. Of course it’s not impossible. The way that have it now is the most efficient way of squeezing money out of us online gamers. Sigh.

Those are just two examples of paid DLC getting under my skin. Doubtless there are many other examples of thumbscrews being put on customers by developers. These are merely my own gripes.

Well I Just Saw The Ugly Side to 1 vs. 100

wardrox — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 18:09:47 +0000

Urgh. Some games are designed well. Some games have their more obvious elements designed well, and clearly no effort put into the rest of them. 1 vs. 100 is the latter. Once again I’m given the finger by a game after being so brash as to do what you would logically expect to be able to do.

I would like to play 1 vs. 100 extended play with some friends. They are in a group, there are three of them. An invite to me is sent, I accept. Up comes the adverts for Microsoft and MS Game Studio. Up come all the warnings and legal fart and then up comes an error message. No options, no information, just a quick “no, fuck you”. And with that the game promptly kicks me out back to some random menu. That was a useful few minuets, thanks!

This menu is 1 vs. 100 specific, it helpfully tells me I can get a reminder for future play sessions. Which clearly is exactly what I’m after at this point. So, I scroll thought the menus (which, of course can’t just be normal menus, thanks to the waste of space NXE), find the session going on right now and hit “join”. And again I get the unskippable adverts, the legal crap, and then some horrid button lag as I am pushed into the lobby. I’m told they are finding me a seat. THERE IS A SEAT OVER THERE, NEXT TO THE OTHER THREE GUYS.

No. For some reason that seat is taken by the invisible man, but this new seat isn’t. This seat surrounded by nobody, and with three empty spaces (which it helpfully, regularly, zooms in on) to my right. Why can’t these games just be designed with normal people and their expected functionality in mind? Best design ever.

And the questions are dumb. Shut up.

Community Reviews Are a Thing

wardrox — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 16:00:29 +0000

If you were to look into our forums today, you may notice something has changed from last week. We have a brand new section called “Community Reviews“. Do not fear this change! For it is good change.

For you see now, your opinion can also be made loud and clear on Negative Gamer! How’s that for socialism! The thinking is that whilst we here running the show talk a lot about games and pass off our opinions as informative reviews, you may also want to do this. Any addition to the conversations being had about gaming is a good thing from my end, and I happen to believe this growing community has some interesting things to say.

You’re welcome to follow our review structure and write your own, Negative Gamer style reviews. Or, you can go with the more standard review styles found on other sites. Or maybe even invent your own style! It’s up to you. I know I’m just interested in reading more people’s opinions.

In future I may start to link to the Community Reviews from within the main reviews, so people can get more opinions on the games they’re interested in. This means you need to make sure to proof read your text thoroughly (failure to do so may result in Half Left screaming “YOU APOSTROPHE RE” so loud a kitten dies).

So there you go. That’s a thing that is.

CoD:MW2 Prestige Edition Comes With Stupid Goggles.

wardrox — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 14:40:59 +0000

I love shooting things and grinding and stuff in a good looking yet utterly generic shooter, so of course I also want night vision to come with the generically-similar and equally rubbish sequel! OMG SO COOOL! I can wear them and look like a prick with too much money. AWESOME!

Special editions are for those gamers who want to pay the developers just that bit extra to have a piece of worthless tat. Well, that’s not true, they are there to make you think you want the worthless tat, when if fact it’s just the publisher wanting to sell you more stuff to make more money. Oh look, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 comes with some branded night vision goggles in its Special Prestige Edition. Night vision goggles. They come with their own display head too, for when you realise you don’t want to actually wear them.

Sigh. Yes I am indeed a burned out husk of a person incapable of comprehending fun, and yes running around with what looks like a toilet paper tube stuck on your face could conceivably be cool, once, if you’re six. You are not in the special ops*, you never will be.

*If you are in special ops, disregard that sentence.

Via: Joystiq

Bioshock 2 Gets a 4th Developer, Also, Delayed!

Wex — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 12:30:15 +0000

New developers stepping in on an existing intellectual property has always been many a fanboy’s wet dream. “Hmm, what if Square Enix made a Pokemon game?” was one of the many conversations that usually abruptly ended in my middle school days. Realistically, however, franchises likes Metroid, Neverwinter Nights, Knights of the Old Republic, and more recently, the Castlevaniaseries have all changed developers, and their sequels have barely lived up to, or been just as good as their predecessors (save Castlevania, who’s newest iteration with Kojima’s team taking some of the production responsibilities isn’t slated to release until 2010).

One of the most recent developments on one of these developer mash-ups is Bioshock 2. The two 2K studios that were already working on the single-player portion, Digital Extremes doing the controversial multiplayer features, and now, Arkane Studios assisting with Art assets, animation, and design.

This, coupled with the recent news that Bioshock 2 would be delayed, does not give me high hopes for all of these hands in the kitchen. I already didn’t like the fact that Bioshock 2 was getting a sequel so soon, and a multiplayer feature that it doesn’t really need. I hope this delay doesn’t negatively effect the game, but I don’t see the four developers that are working on this project wowing me as much as the first Bioshock did. Let’s hope that 2K, Digital Extremes, and Arkane Studios can prove me wrong.

What T-Shirt Size Are You?

wardrox — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 11:10:26 +0000

Hey, would you look at that? I wonder what all this is about. Ah well, best do what the man says and click on my t-shirt size.

Xbox Community Games: Make Mine A Double

njsykora — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 16:20:35 +0000

You realise this feature has been going for 3 months now? Scary huh.

A communication/real life fail meant we didn’t get this done last week and a computer fail on my end meant this didn’t get done yesterday. So shout from the rooftops you lucky Monday fans because you get the Cgame recap on your favourite day for once. In a change to the usual formula we’re only looking in depth at actual games for this double week recap, I’ve come to think it’s not really fair to judge a perfectly functional utility released on the service by the standards of a videogame. Don’t worry, even taking them out there’s been plenty of turds dropped this fortnight.

Chart news and we have a new champion!! RC-Air Sim has been well and truly kerbstomped by the Microsoft Research project Kodu. While Kodu is on the Cgame channel I won’t be covering it in this article, however there will be a full scale Not Review coming up sometime soon. The rest of the chart is the usual mess of Aquariums and Massages, let’s get down to business.

RotorMania
Raccoon456 – 200 Points

XNA puzzlers have a tendency to want to be the new Rubik’s Cube, that is damn near impossible and insanely frustrating yet just rewarding enough to ensure you keep coming back to it. Remarkably RotorMania seems to have nailed that formula through being a full 3D puzzle with an insane amount of difficulty even on the easy setting to someone who’s not particularly keen on Rubik’s style puzzles. Simply put you rotate blocks around a central axis while shuffling them up and down into empty spaces to try and make the columns match up in terms of colour. Like a Rubik’s Cube it’s a case of planning ahead enough so that all 6 columns fall into place at the right time, this is helped by a 2D minimap to keep tabs on where everything is without having to scroll around the full column. The drop and return appeal of a Cube is also enabled with an autosave system. Probably one of the best puzzlers I’ve seen in some time, XNA or otherwise.

Buy It!

Game Training: Dexterity
Justin le Clair – 400 Points

I’ve been a videogamer for 16 years, so I’m a little curious at the idea of a series of games that can improve my skills as a gamer using minigames. Dexterity presents itself as a DDR style rhythm game, control functions such as a d-pad direction or a face button scroll up the screen and you hit them when they get to the top. However whether it’s a design choice or a bug I’m not sure but just holding down the button will count the hit. So it doesn’t work as a rhythm game, the notation isn’t particularly challenging for anyone who’s ever played Rock Band, and the music is dull as hell. So to put it simply, if I want to train as a gamer, I’ll go play a videogame thanks.

Leave to Die

Bennu
AlMra – 400 Points

Bennu is a game about swinging. Think the Ninja Rope Racing from Worms mixed with Breakout and you will actually be pretty close to the mark for this one. Using a ball on a chain the idea is to knock out all the coloured blocks in a level by swinging around, changing colours and effectively smashing up all your chain’s attach points. As blocks disappear it gets harder to get the remaining blocks purely because there are fewer places to hang the chain. The physics are hugely exaggerated to the point where while a good hard swing makes it easier and faster to get higher up it’s not necessary to build up a swing to progress. The whole look of the game is very charming as well, presented as an Egyptian puppet theatre. However the fiddlyness of firing the chain and the deceptive length of said chain makes this otherwise excellent game incredibly annoying.

Try It

Eye-Ball
Von Chrono – 200 Points

Pong. Moving on.

Leave to Die

Roid Riot
Chaos Nyrb – 200 Points

Full 3D space shooter sim, it sounds so good on paper but presentation lets Roid Riot down. Boring visuals once you get past the 3D stuff and some rather poor controls really ruin this promising shooter.

Leave to Die

Gamerbots
Hotwave Games – 400 Points

Excellent. Truly stunning. A full 3D third person shooter with insane levels of customisation and a single player that effectively works out as a career mode. Completing missions and online matches earns money that can then be used to buy new parts for your Gamerbot (a cute little robot with your gamer picture on the front) as well as new and upgraded weaponry and the ammo required for those weapons. A few odd control choices (no manual reload, right bumper used to shoot) will feel nasty at first but the game as a whole is incredibly fun and surprisingly challenging. Another Community Games essential.

Buy It!

Lotus: Stellar Conflict
MindStar Games – 400 Points

Regular readers may remember Project Alpha from about a month ago. A space shooter based around trade and shooting stuff. Lotus is pretty similar but with the focus gone from free trade to mission based combat. This I would say is what the XBLA Wing Commander game should’ve been. the voice acting, while clearly done by a group of mates with headset mics, is passable enough to be enjoyable and shooting stuff is simple enough to be fun immediately while having enough depth to satisfy in the long term. Only real complaint from me is that I would’ve liked a customisable weapon loadout like in games like Wing Commander and Freespace, but as it stands this is a very solid addition to the catalogue.

Try It

Get the Ball
Clay Schubiner – 200 Points

I was all set to hate this, screenshots don’t really get the point across I don’t think. In reality what looks like (and is) a very quickly thrown together game actually turns out to be pretty entertaining for a few minutes. I don’t think it’ll stay fun in the long term but it’s another entry in the list of cheap games that will be fun if you have some drunk/stoned friends around.

Try It

Button Memory
Thunder Hammer Studios – 200 Points

You know what I’m about to say. Yep, it’s Simon once again.

Leave to Die

Also This Week
Fans of international time zones can check out World Clock, art fans can have a look at Landscape and Urban Art Galleries, Etch-a-Sketch is available in the form of Sketch and anyone interested by mildly decent dual stick shooters may like to know that a Lite version of Karnn Age is now available for 200 points.

That’s all for this double week. Game of the Week honours go to the brilliant Gamerbots and please let me know what you think of the new condensed style I’m trying out here. If you fancy making some games of your own then either head over to XNA Creator’s Club for the full monty or ease yourself in gently with Kodu.

Negative Gamer Review: EA Sports Active (Wii) Week Two

OrangeGoblin — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 15:19:47 +0000

I’m now half-way through the EA Sports Active 30 Day Challenge, so it’s time for an update. Last week I complained about the lack of “game” exercises and the slightly stupid peripherals, but admitted that I found myself drawn back to the Wii for my regular exercise.

This week was totally different. Pretty much every day I used EA Sports Active this week, I begrudged having to turn on the little white box. Not due to laziness, mind – I was just bored.

All workout and no play makes Jake a dull boy

In the first week, the 30 Day Challenge introduces new exercises every session. Some of these are more interesting than others, but the variety brought me back as I wanted to see what was new.

Now it seems I’ve already gotten through most of the content on the disc. This week added sports like volleyball and baseball, but the repetitive actions (swing the bat 16 times!) coupled with poor motion detection did little to entertain me.

I also began to skip exercises, which you can thankfully do from the pause menu. Again, this wasn’t because I didn’t feel energetic enough to do the exercise. I simply couldn’t face another set of bloody lunges.

EA Sports Active is certainly getting me fit. Brutal exercises like a 60 second squat (much harder than it sounds) or fast kick-ups really feel like a good workout, but I just wish I was having fun. These kids are loving it, so why aren’t I?

Before starting the 30 Day Challenge, my normal exercise routine was half an hour on a stationary bike whilst playing Burnout Paradise. Whilst the exercise might be pretty dull, I never cared because my brain was occupied in trying not to crash at 280mph. Why can’t I be entertained in the same way by EA Sports Active?

A few other points worth mentioning:

The time between exercise repetitions seems to vary wildly for no reason. Sometimes I’ll have to wait less than a second between reps, at other times it will be two or three. If you try to do it out of time, the trainer complains and makes you do it again.
My issues with the leg strap seem to have gone away. I guess I just wasn’t wearing it tight enough. The resistance band is still rubbish though.
You can choose to exercise on rest days, which I had to do once this week. A warning is offered up, but you can just click through.

I think what it boils down to is that I’m not the target audience. As a gamer, I really feel that EA missed out on the opportunity to incorporate exercise motions into a mini-game collection. This approach would likely put off non-gamers though, who see EA Sports Active as just another exercise tool, like an aerobics class or a fitness DVD. And it’s a good exercise tool, so I’ll be keeping it up for another week despite the boredom. Check back next Monday for another update.

Death In Videogames, Should There Be More?

Will "the-wolf" — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 10:03:17 +0000

[SPOILER WARNING: The following article directly references major plot elements of Chrono Trigger, Half Life 2: Episode Two, Bioshock and Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess.]

On the surface videogames are full of death. Whether it’s losing a life in Mario or slaying aliens in Halo almost every game has some element of death. But, how many games actually include meaningful deaths? Killing a character can be an extremely effective element of narrative yet few games seem to realise its potential.

In most cases, death is reserved for punishing the player, implementing limitations upon the gameplay and adding a level of challenge. Failure to meet the game’s requirements results in the death of the player but this simply means that the failed section of game has to be replayed until it’s completed successfully. In the end this has very little emotive impact, creating a sense of frustration at most.

Another common use of death is to remove enemies. As a regular feature of most games, they act as an obstacle for the player. Killing them allows the player to progress through the game but they rarely have a strong impact on the game’s narrative, or elicit an emotional response from the player (with the exception of some ‘boss’ characters).

Whilst these types of death are commonplace, ‘real’ death is rarely featured. There are few examples of games where characters are permanently removed from the storyline, and the majority of the instances I could think of were from RPGs. The fact that RPGs tend to focus more on story than other games though is likely to have impacted on the number of deaths found within the genre.

For RPGs, character deaths can be dated back to 1989 with Phantasy Star II. Nei’s death within the game is possibly the earliest example of a playable character being permanently removed from a game. However, one of the most effective character deaths I have experienced from an RPG is Crono’s from Chrono Trigger.

For me, the death of Crono not only radically altered the plot of the game but also evoked a strong emotional response. Part of this can be linked to the fact that Crono is the character that you have constantly had control of from the start of the game, he can’t be moved from the head of the party and is the overall protagonist. To suddenly have him completely removed from the game comes as a great shock and from a practical viewpoint, you have lost a strong character from battle along with all his equipment.

Although the game does provide the opportunity to resurrect Crono, it is more of a side quest and it is possible to beat the game without reviving him. By allowing the player freedom to decide whether or not Crono should return to the party, it allows you to become much more involved with the game’s story. Without Crono’s death, Chrono Trigger would be simply another generic JRPG. Having him killed results in a less linear gameplay experience for the remainder of the game, ultimately giving the player more freedom of choice and control over the ending.

Although character deaths are more easily identifiable within the RPG genre (with other notable cases found in Final Fantasy VII, most strategy RPGs and, more recently, Mass Effect) effective character deaths are present in other genres. Whilst it is arguably easier to implement character death into RPGs, thanks to the player’s access to a number of characters and the genre’s focus on story, there are cases of emotive deaths elsewhere.

For example, the end of Half Life 2: Episode Two uses the death of a character to completely change the tone of the game. After beating the game you are left with a relieved and jubilant mood until just before the credits begin. As Gordon Freeman and Alyx Vance are about to leave they are ambushed and immobilised along with Alyx’s father Eli Vance.

As the scene ends, Eli is killed but Alyx and Gordon are rescued. However, by this point the sense of achievement and relief felt after completing the final mission are totally replaced by shock and outrage. Considering that Eli only appears for short periods throughout the game, I believe that this somehow intensified the reaction to his death. Although he can be considered a main character, his sporadic involvement with the game’s main narrative, and distance from most combat, does not make him an obvious candidate to be killed. It is this perceived invulnerability and the presumption of safety and a ‘happy ending’ that make his death so effective. I find it unlikely that people could have predicted his death, and without it, HL2E2’s ending would ultimately have been much more generic and forgettable than it actually was.

Another FPS to include the effective death of a character was Bioshock with Andrew Ryan. Unlike most deaths I have mentioned, Andrew Ryan is portrayed as the enemy. It also differs in that he orders you, the player, to kill him, effectively committing suicide. In doing so a major part of Bioshock’s plot is revealed. The revelations gained from killing Ryan are greatly intensified through his death, leaving the player feeling used and helpless. Although it would have been possible to convey these elements of the plot without murdering Ryan, by ensuring that the player is responsible for his death, the information that is revealed has a deeper emotional impact as well as grounding it within the reality of the game.

As these games have shown, character death can have a vast impact within the realms of videogame narrative. Some of my most memorable moments of gaming have resulted out of these deaths but as a narrative device, death is still somewhat unused in games. For the death to actually have an impact though, a game needs to have a strong focus on story, as shown by the higher number of deaths in the RPG genre. Obviously, this means that any genre could potentially have a meaningful death providing that the story was strong enough. For example, death in a Zelda game could be very interesting. Given the slightly darker nature of Twilight Princess, there were plenty of opportunities for a character to be removed from the game. Killing Ilia, rather than kidnapping her for instance, would have had a much greater emotional impact, especially if it remained at the same point in the game’s plot.

With the current lack of ‘real’ deaths in games when a character is killed it is generally unexpected and shocking. I only hope that as videogame narrative continues to evolve that death does not become yet another cliché.

David Perry Gets All up in OnLive’s Grill

Joshingo — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 02:00:09 +0000

Well it seems David Perry is none too impressed with rival game-streaming service OnLive. In a recent interview with Develop he detailed the differences between OnLive and the newly announced Gaikai.

Interestingly Perry remarks that his “goal is to get people playing these games for free, until people either buy the console, buy the game, or decide to start paying for the game.” This is opposed to the OnLive subscription based model. He expressed a desire to work with console makers rather than against them, noting that he didn’t believe OnLive were doing the same.

A pretty obvious difference between ourselves and OnLive is the fact that they’ll never have an Nintendo, Sony or Microsoft game on their system.

OnLive is trying to directly compete with the platform holders. It’s trying to rule the living room. The OnLive team is basically trying to build a portal where you can go and sign up for a subscription and get a piece of hardware to play games on.

Perry also noted that while OnLive were planning on launching only 5 data centres in North America, Gaikai was scheduled to have at least 12. He then used this momentum to insinuate that OnLive have not considered peak playing times while designing their networks.

At the end of the day, the OnLive team will have to build a network ready to handle the demand that they’ll be advertising to get. So the network needs to be designed to handle peak demand.

So there you have it, folks. The grudge match begins, taking all bets now. The humour in all this is that neither service has adequately proven to most players that their system will actually work under real life conditions rather than a demo computer. From a consumer point of view it is a little bit sad to see trash talking of this magnitude, but maybe also a bit comforting to see that there is some healthy competition going on. Personally I would be tempted to call Perry a rabble-rouser if he wasn’t so damn sexy. Damn sexy Dave.

Via: The Escapist

Negative Gamer Review: Transform-A-Snack (Spicy)

wardrox — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 17:02:27 +0000

There comes a time in every gamer’s life when you just need to eat a flavoured maize snack. Be it to supplement a World of Warcraft marathon (or “evening” as some call it), an active disregard for your own health or even the need to be crunching on something loud whilst using any form of in-game team speak. On last week’s NGCast, our very own Gandysampras highlighted the joys of the Tranform-A-Snack, so I thought it only fair to bring you, dear readers, the official Negative Gamer review of this Golden Wonder branded food substitute. No artificial colours.

The idea behind the product is that in each packet, there are two different shapes. One shape is that of a man, Captain Crunch, the other shape is that of a wheel. Attaching the wheels to the arms and legs of Captain Crunch miraculously transforms him into the speedy Crunch Car. Contains milk. Suitable for Vegetarians.

So, about that transforming thing

The main draw of these crisps in particular is, as the title suggests, their ability to transform. Using just one Captain Crunch shape and four wheels, you can watch your snack change form in a way unseen in other snacks. This ratio of one to four however is the first falling point of the crisps. In the interest of fairness I bought a multi-pack, so six packets in total. One of the packets only had three wheels in total in it. This left me with a Crunch Tricycle and several, redundant, Captain Crunches. Hardly what you want when battling his arch nemesis Baron Von Scoffalot (no, seriously, read the comic … the comic that is on the website for the snack food … actually).

Even with the right ratio, the problems seldom go away. As these are fairly week, corn based shapes, most of the ones I found within my packets were broken well in advance of my playing. This means even if there is the right ratio, chances are you will have spare torsos or parts of wheel. And what’s the point in them? If I can’t transform anything, they may as well be Space Raiders.

Needs more guns

Still, when the stars align and you are able to get the right number of both Captain Crunchs and wheels, you can start the transformation. A transformation into disappointment. Even before attaching the back wheels it becomes very clear there isn’t enough room for them to fit one behind the other. The axles are far to close together to even attempt to get the wheels lined up, as you can see in the picture.

When I think of transformers, one thing that comes to mind is either giant guns, giant swords, or Michael Bay style giant explosions, none of those can be found within the Transform-A-Snack. Admittedly the guns, swords and explosions have been replaced with a crunchy maize texture and sharp flavour, but it still comes across as a bit of a disappointment.

With regard to the flavour; the packets I tried were all Spicy, and to me they tasted more like Pickled Onion (an alternative flavour). The Spicy flavour did live up to its name in the literal sense, however, I don’t feel it differentiated itself enough from other, spicy or pickle flavoured maize snacks to really be remarkable.

A few other points worth mentioning:

There are several available flavours, but Asda (where I bought mine) only stocked the Spicy flavour.
I tried shaping the wheels and bodies with a knife to see if I could get a properly formed Crunch Car, however it predictably resulted in the individual shapes just breaking and falling apart.
As best I can find, Captain Crunch has no theme tune.

All things considered, the expected novelty of the product is out-weighed by the many failings it has. The expectations the Transform-A-Snack brand give you are seldom met and I inevitably ended up just eating the snacks normally. The draw of the transforming ability will likely pull you in to a purchase, but the un-inspiring results will disappoint.

You should eat this snack if…

… you enjoy going on imaginary adventures with your food.

Final Score

A well rounded snack with an under performing transformation ability.

(What does this score mean?)

Rumours About PSP2 Distract From Sony’s Messaging

Philbart999 — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 13:57:19 +0000

It would seem that despite the impending fall launch of the PSPgo, PSP2 rumours just won’t go away. Engadget picked up a story last week about the PSP2 that had its genesis last year involving leads from Eurogamer. Also following this rumour, gamesindustry.biz updated their story they first reported on last year regarding the likely chipset of the rumoured in-development PSP2.

In the gamesindustry article Imagination Technologies is rumoured to;

be working with Sony on the PSP2 [...] when the company announced it had stuck a deal with a ‘major consumer electronics company.’ The site claims to have information from insider sources stating that a quad core iteration of the low-power SGX543MP chip, codenamed Hydra, will be present in the next generation handheld, not to be confused with the forthcoming PSPgo.

I can’t help but wonder how much longer Sony feels that they can cling to the PSP. Even the PSPgo that is due out soon is essentially a marginal upgrade sans UMD but with digital distribution. Since its 2005 release, Sony’s handheld has struggled with comparisons to the Nintendo DS. Where the DS has successfully dominated the handheld market as a whole with a variety of clever games designed to utilize the stylus, the PSP’s early ports of home console games failed to resonate early on.

In sad irony; Sony has recently been building a decent software library for its handheld. Even with a large marketing engine behind PSPgo and with games like God of War:Chains of Olympus, Patapon 2, not to mention the pending arrival of Gran Turismo-PSP it looks like Sony will continue to struggle with staying on message. The Engadget and Games Industry articles tell us that despite Sony’s focus on PSP the market is ready for a true upgrade to the platform with *ahem* a second analog nub thank you very much.

Wardrox’s Vlog 12th July; Community Reviews and Evony

wardrox — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 12:57:47 +0000

For the most part of this week’s Vlog I just chatted about the new Community Reviews section in the forum. The idea is that you guys can now post your reviews up to NG where the rest of us can read it. Which I think is rather awesome. I also spoke briefly about the Evony adverts, and how I don’t want this site to end up being desperate for hits. Also, watching the video back, I too spotted the gap in my hawk at the back.

In What Can Only Be Self-Parody; Evony Goes All In

wardrox — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 00:50:10 +0000

… or should that be “Evony reaches the lowest point possible”?

What you see to your left is not, as you should expect, the work of this article’s author. Nor is it the work of any other website commenting on the current buzz Evony is creating with is, ahem, interesting adverts. We here at Negative Gamer would like to think we are at the cutting edge of Evony journalism, and can say with some confidence that this is in fact a real advert for the game.

Real in the sense it is an advert, in an ad-network that does go to the Evony site. Is it actually meant as a sincere attempt to gain traffic via the lure of breasts? I sure hope not. Still, it got us talking about it. Well played Evony PR. Well played.

In other news, here is an article titled Don’t play Evony in which a blogger complains he is being spammed with Evony spam-comments.

Evony Adverts; Redux

Halfleft — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 20:56:30 +0000

Those sly devils! It looks like the developers of browser game Evony which you will have doubtlessly seen advertised here (oh it’s totally awesome and you should all definitely play it or whatever) obviously are avid readers of Negative Gamer. Not three days had passed since this post and already they have recognised the chance to connect with their target audience in a more direct manner. Now THAT is some damn fine market awareness.

It seems that the further revealing of some fictional boobies as highlighted on here is just not sexy enough for a medieval RTS browser gamer (I think, I can’t say for sure as I don’t play terrible-looking games). They’ve gone and turned the sexy to eleven, so-to-speak.

Have a gander yourself. Just mouse over the following to see the new background image.

Brilliant isn’t it? When I first saw it I got an erection so quickly that my laptop was fired off my lap, through the ceiling, and into space at a velocity that can’t have been less than 700 metres per second.